The present invention relates to a heating apparatus, or appliance, for cooking or frying in a fluid, such as a deep fryer for example, having a cooking container surrounded by an external skirt forming the facade of the apparatus, heating means and pilot means for controlling and monitoring the operating cycle of the apparatus.
Heating apparatus of the type mentioned above, and for example electric fryers, conventionally include a cooking container, or tank, made of metal for example, surrounded by an external skirt, or housing, which is spaced at a distance from the tank, the skirt generally being made of polypropylene. The skirt forms the facade, or external surface, of the apparatus. The heating means are conventionally constituted by at least one shielded electric heating resistor disposed beneath the bottom of the tank and in heat exchange relation therewith. Known electric fryers also include, as pilot means for their operating cycle, various indicators, such as lights, and control or regulating buttons, as well as thermal limiters or controls for the operation of the heating resistor. Thermal limiters are, for example, constituted by a thermostat which may or may not be associated with a fuse, the thermostat being adjustable through the intermediary of a button or dial disposed on the facade of the apparatus. The thermostat and the associated fuse or fuses are in general situated near the bottom of the tank.
Electric fryers designed according to the above-described principles require, in the event of a malfunction of the thermostat or melting of the safety fuse, a substantial disassembly of the apparatus to permit replacement of defective parts and/or the safety fuse. Such a repair operation is of course difficult and time consuming and constitutes a disadvantage which is linked to the very design of the apparatus. Moreover, the installation in the body of the fryer of the totality of the electric wiring connected to the thermal limiters and to the various means for controlling and monitoring the operating cycle of the apparatus equally constitute a drawback linked to the design of the apparatus. It is also in order to note that assembly of such fryers requires a conveyance of the fryer on assembly lines, which constitutes a drawback on the industrial level.
It is also known, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,904,852, to arrange, in a removable manner in the housing of a cooking system, pilot means, i.e. monitoring and control means, and in particular a computer module connected to a sensor, or probe, disposed at the interior of the cooking tank. Such a design does not permit temperature increases within the cooking tank to be monitored in a simple manner.